


I Knew You Were Trouble

by Dorasolo



Category: Ant-Man (Movies)
Genre: Ant-Man 2015, Companion Piece, F/M, POV Scott Lang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-18 10:21:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29116692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dorasolo/pseuds/Dorasolo
Summary: “Thanks,” she murmurs, making eye contact for a heated second, and again Scott feels the tiny pulse of awareness between them.“Happy to help,” he offers, keeping his voice light, though his stomach dips and swerves like he’s on a roller coaster.“I’ll put that on your Yelp review,” Hope answers, deadpan. “Scott Lang: helpful.”Did you want more romance with your Ant-Man 2015 timeline? Great. Here we go.
Relationships: Scott Lang/Hope Van Dyne
Comments: 12
Kudos: 49





	I Knew You Were Trouble

“Gotcha,” Hope Van Dyne crows triumphantly, her arm tucked under Scott Lang’s chin, and he sees stars as she squeezes too tightly on his neck. His body goes limp, turning into dead weight across her much smaller frame. Once she realizes he’s blacking out, she releases her grip around his neck. 

“Oh shit, sorry,” she says sheepishly, the apology touched with just the barest hint of sincerity. As he regains consciousness he thinks to himself that he’ll take it anyway.

“Sure,” he chokes, catching his breath, still lying on his back on top of her. “You might want to consider letting me win once or twice,” he teases, after he’s sure he can speak after the hold. “I really could use some encouragement here.” 

“You could use many things, Scott Lang, but encouragement is not one of them,” Hope says smartly, and though he can’t see her face, he can feel her eyes roll. “Now, get off of me,” she demands. He complies.

Later that afternoon is the first time he wins the grappling match and she doesn’t punch him in the face afterwards. 

***

They settle into a routine of sorts, a crash course in all things Ant-Man. Scott is staying in Hank’s spare bedroom, sleeping in the same mystery sourced pajamas that he found himself wearing the first night he arrived. Hank wakes him at the ass crack of dawn to learn the suit’s mechanics and how to utilize the Pym particle disks. Scott practices shrinking and growing through obstacle courses set in the backyard for most of the morning while Hank alternately barks orders or quietly watches him, marking notes in a little spiral bound notebook. 

Hope starts coming by the house on her lunch break to help Scott learn about the ants and with combat training in the basement. By the time they’re learning about carpenter ants at the end of the second week, Hope has stopped sitting across the room reading dry tomes of ant facts to him. Now, she spends her time peering down into a case of ants next to him, their foreheads millimeters from touching. Hope tucks her dark hair behind one ear while they work, and even though Scott has been out of the game for a very, very long time, he’s pretty sure there’s something curious thrumming between them. He opts to say nothing to her about that, knowing she’ll deny it emphatically and he doesn’t think his ego can take it. Instead, they continue this cautious dance, and Hope’s insults slowly change into banter.

On a Wednesday, Hope accidentally drops her microscope as they’re looking at the crazy ants, but Scott’s hand darts out, deftly catching it before it drops to the ground and shatters. 

“Thanks,” she murmurs, making eye contact for a heated second, and again Scott feels the tiny pulse of awareness between them.

“Happy to help,” he offers, keeping his voice light, though his stomach dips and swerves like he’s on a roller coaster. 

“I’ll put that on your Yelp review,” Hope answers, deadpan. “Scott Lang: helpful.” 

*** 

After they open up to each other about their families unexpectedly in Hope’s car, she teaches him how to communicate with the ants. With that huge obstacle behind them, Scott feels lighter despite the incredible weight of their next step: rescuing a part from the Avengers Headquarters in upstate New York. Even with additional planning for that heist, their routine has become almost fun, even though he’s utterly exhausted and quite frankly, scared shitless.

Hope has started hanging out at Hank’s house after she’s done at work. After she decompresses about Darren’s updates to his Yellowjacket suit, sometimes they’ll spar in the basement a second time, and lately she’s started staying for dinner. They’re two days out from his trip to New York, and tonight she has disappeared after helping him clear the dishes to do some work related calls in Hank’s office. 

Scott assumes she’ll let herself out when she’s finished, so he heads into Hank’s den to watch TV (despite Hank’s continual objection to Scott rotting his brain with the television, Hank still pays for cable). Scott flips channels aimlessly, pausing when he sees The Mighty Ducks on one of the stations. Grinning, he settles into the recliner at the end of the L shaped sofa, kicking his feet out. This is exactly what he wants to watch to amp himself up for an underdog type victory at PymTech. 

He has just about zoned out while watching Emilio Estevez (as Gordon Bombay) get arrested for a DUI when he hears noises in the kitchen. Without getting up, because this recliner is really that comfortable, he cranes his head to look expectantly at the doorway between the rooms. Hope appears in yoga pants and a hoodie, as dressed down as he’s ever seen her outside of the mats downstairs. Her makeup has been scrubbed off her face, but her eyes are still wide and bright. Hope Van Dyne is a beautiful woman and would be even if she was wearing a burlap sack, and despite his pleasantly swirling guts at the sight of her, Scott manages to calmly raise his eyebrows at her in greeting.

Hope holds up a beer in response, and from far away he can see that it’s something light. “I thought you might want to have a drink with me,” she suggests, tipping the bottle nose in his direction. He gets up slowly, grimacing and whining theatrically about his myriad of bruises and general soreness. He ambles over to her, a half smile on his face.

“Don’t be such a baby,” she chides, but there’s decidedly a twinkle in her green eyes that he likes. 

“Don’t be so derogatory towards babies,” he responds glibly, and he feels gratified when she looks away to hide a grin.

Scott takes the beer from her hand, and she jolts, a barely perceptible movement, when their fingers accidentally touch. Hope ducks her head, avoiding his eyes, and focuses over his shoulder at the movie on the screen. 

“The Mighty Ducks? I love this movie,” she exclaims, shocking him completely, and she twists off the top of her beer. 

Scott gives her a strange look. “I would have expected you to hate this movie, you know, because the prefect Hawks lose to a ragtag misfit, down on their luck, team of potential criminals.” 

“Very funny,” she says, giving him a dirty look while pushing past him to stride towards the couch. “I’ll have you know that I always root for the underdog. But I do admit that Adam Banks is my favorite player.” 

She sits down on the recliner that he vacated and eyes him with a challenge after taking his seat. Scott sighs and flops down on the longer part of the L, facing her. “Of course you’re a Banks fan,” he says lightly. 

She looks at him, clearly waiting for him to elaborate, so he scrambles to put his thoughts into words. “You’d absolutely rebel the second you saw something wrong going on, you’ve got integrity,” he explains, “but I’m not sure you would ever be the underdog otherwise. You’re way too driven for that. People should bet on you winning.” 

Hope eyes him suspiciously, like she’s waiting for a punchline. When he says nothing, she nods, a pinkish blush staining her high cheekbones. After a pause that seems to last for eons, she raises her beer in a cheers motion. He returns the gesture. Their eyes meet for a few seconds too long, so she clears her throat, but says nothing. Instead, they watch the movie together in companionable silence, though it’s not quite a comfortable one. Scott is out of practice at these things, but he knows that there’s a spark here. If only he knew what to do with it.

*** 

Scott spends a second cross country plane ride freezing his ass off shrunken down to ant size in the plane’s mechanical structure. The ants with him are sending him the regular amorphous ant thoughts they always do, but there’s a collective longing for warmth. The urge to go closer to a heat source intensifies, so he distracts himself by imagining what Hope and Hank will say once they realize the mission was successful. Tucked into his suit lies the device Hank told him to steal, and he managed this heist after fighting the Falcon.

Pretty neat, right? 

Scott is certain he’ll never admit just how much sweat has now pooled in unmentionable places after realizing he fought an Avenger and lived. 

It figures that Hank just starts screaming at him about how reckless and stupid he was out there, and it also figures that all it takes to shut down the typical Hank diatribe is plonk the gadget right there on the table. 

“You got it,” Hope says, hiding a smile, her voice decidedly amused as she looks up at him through her blunt cut bangs. He winks at her. Hank takes a nanosecond to congratulate him, but that pales in comparison to Hope sizing him up openly, her glance at him doing weird, squeezing things to his chest.

Scott thinks he’ll remember her striped sweater forever, partly because he lets himself openly check her out in response and she doesn’t kill him on the spot. 

He thinks impressing her with a burglary plan is the bonus, even if it involves Luis; her horror at Luis’s pride for stealing smoothie machines a palpable entity in the kitchen. 

He’s wrong. The bonus is when she tells him she almost likes him, an admission he knows is costly for her when she’s spent her life feeling rejected by Hank. Adrenaline soars through his blood, even though he deflects by joking that she should write poetry. Scott would absolutely call Hope his friend, but if all goes well after this absurd heist that will probably get him killed, maybe that will change. Maybe if he survives, he’ll change it. 

*** 

He survives. 

She goes to walk him out of Hank’s house, where he will no longer be staying. The job is over, they don’t have plans to see each other ever again, and now they’re standing outside Hank’s door, ignoring the elephant in the room. 

“So you’re going to get official visitation rights now?” 

Hope bites her bottom lip and looks up at him through her bangs, her arms crossed in what can only be described as a protective gesture; she doesn’t like saying goodbye either but she certainly won’t say so. Scott knows it’s up to him. 

“That’s the plan,” Scott answers, smiling. “It’ll be awesome to see Cassie. She’s great. A really smart kid, you’d like her, I’m sure. Hey, you could meet her, if you wanted,” he suggests, but then he feels kind of like an ass, foisting the idea of meeting his kid on Hope. 

She flashes a smile, still looking down at the ground, color dotting her cheeks. “I’d like that,” she agrees, and she even sounds sincere. 

“Or maybe we could get coffee,” he suggests hurriedly, brain moving slower than his mouth, as usual. “We could meet for coffee.” 

Arms still crossed, she finally looks up at him head on, making eye contact. “I don’t think you should give a 7 year old coffee,” she jokes, a half smile pulling up the right corner of her mouth. “They might take away your visitation again.” 

“Hope,” he starts, startled but sort of thrilled with her lame ass joke.

“Scott,” she says at the same time, and just like that, he knows he’s going to kiss her, crossed arms and all. So he does.

**Author's Note:**

> I took a romance writing course over this pandemic and all it really made me want to do is write more Scotthope banter. My poor neglected original fic says “do what you gotta do, I guess.”


End file.
